The Monday After: The Resurrection Changes Everything {Anita}

You know that Sunday feeling, right?

We leave the church building inspired and filled with Truth and encouragement on Sundays … and somewhere along the course of the week, pieces of the message tend to fade and we often lose that Sunday feeling.

The Monday After {the Sunday Sermon} carries the Sunday message into Monday mornings by sharing how what we’ve heard on Sunday morning is making a difference in our Mondays, our weeks, our lives. Because of your generosity to Accelerate, we are able to share these stories! Thank you!

The Monday After Sunday, April 20, 2014: The Resurrection Changes Everything. {Listen HERE)

By Anita Everly

My aisle seat in the solemn sanctuary was stilled in pitch black when the spotlight burst on, not on stage, but beside me. Eyes blinked, adjusting to the harsh brightness from behind.

My 15-year-old ears could barely take in the accompanying auditory overload. Whips snapping against the floor, following seconds behind by the screams of the young men in Roman garb. They were relentless giants and my body flinched at every crack of the whip and shout of their callous mouths.

My head sternly forward, I was strengthening for the moment they passed by my peripheral, but they were not the first thing I saw.

The tip of the old rugged cross slowly came into sight with Jesus heaving underneath the weight, his crown of thorns jolting back with each strike on his already bloodied and bruised back. The exhale of his breath met the tears that flowed hot from my eyes and the rear Roman soldier’s sash hit my shoulder as he lifted his arm towering above my head to bring down another blow.

That was the day the crucifixion became more than a cross for me. The day His love for me penetrated my life with the gravity of what He endured because of me.

I realized just this holy week that while I have lived as if my sins were forgiven and Christ died to pay the price, I have continued to carry around the consequences, my guilt and shame.

While the Word and preachers have made it clear that Jesus took away my sins, the guilt and shame associated with these, I have compartmentalized and allowed them to linger in my heart. Though I’ve sung “Jesus paid it all,” I fail to live in the truth of “all.”

We are all plagued by the sins of our humanness daily. More than likely, just like Lisa who shared her beautiful story, you have tried to “get clean” too. Whether we battle addiction, deception, pride, laziness, self-sufficiency or unashamedly revel in our sins, we all need to get clean.

And I couldn’t have loved Lisa’s words more: “I had stopped using drugs, but I had not allowed myself to start healing because I was trying to heal myself. And that’s not the way it works. It works by accepting that Jesus Christ died not just for all of us, but for me. And I felt all the stains washed from me.”

Whether it’s our fresh belief or a seasoned faith that needs to take hold and run full into His freedom and grace, we need to yield to His resurrection power and let him do the work we were never intended to do.

We were never meant to carry these sins or their guilt and shame. They were crucified on the cross and buried with Him. And on the third day He arose. The words of the Scriptures and prophets were fulfilled as all darkness of Friday was defeated by the King of kings, our Sunday King.

None before or since has unleashed such power.

When we move toward being Sunday’s child, we live in a hope that is eternal and rest in His power, instead of fight in our own.

It is in Sunday that we can truly know the truth that by His stripes we are healed—of all.

It’s the Monday after.

Are you living in Friday or Sunday today?

Anita Everly is the wife of David and mom to their three sons. She can be found watching the lives of her men unfold, creating a home, and encouraging other women in life and motherhood. She is striving to live life on purpose because she is crazy in love with the One who is crazy in love with her.

The vivid description you gave at the beginning allowed me to visualize myself there with you. My prayer this morning was that I too would live a life of freedom and allow myself to truly embrace His grace and not linger in guilt or shame.